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Show Stoppers
Now that Lou Grant has been canceled, ace reporter Billie Newman (a/k/a Linda Kelsey) is out of a job. But she says she won't go the Vegas route like some other performers. "Unfortunately," confesses Kelsey, "besides acting, my talents are knitting and cooking. If any nightclub wants its patrons to watch me knit, it would be great. And I could make a salad for an encore."

Making a List, Checking It Twice
In April, Robert Kingsbury, a retired Army major and head of the Los Angeles County Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, suggested that the Pentagon make up a list of individuals who should be hustled onto a "Noah's ark" in the event of nuclear attack. The idea, he said, is that society "would benefit most by having those with skills available to start rebuilding a new civilization." That got syndicated columnist Ellen Goodman to thinking, and a few weeks ago she published the names of several people "who are not going to make the passenger list. I must begin," she began, "by cutting Bill Blass and Calvin Klein. There is just no market in this new world for designer chocolates and blue jeans. Nor will we need Richard Simmons, Dr. Atkins, Judy Mazel or the owner of any diet workshop." Goodman also got around to refusing folks like Barbara Cartland, Ozzy Osbourne, Liz Smith and Masters and Johnson. The reactions, predictably, were mixed. "Ellen is right," wrote Smith in her column, "I am definitely expendable." Helen Caldicott, head of the Physicians for Social Responsibility, took Goodman's column more seriously, citing it as evidence that "people are in a frenzy over trivial things so that they can avoid the subject of nuclear disaster."

Grave Stones
"The Rolling Stones are coming—the biggest show in the world," headlined West Germany's Der Spiegel newsmagazine on the eve of the arrival of the group. Nearly a half million tickets had been sold before the Stones showed up last week for the first of 10 concerts. In West Berlin, security forces already overworked with preparations for President Reagan's visit braced for a possible recurrence of the violence that erupted when the Stones played there in 1965. Some Stones fans were annoyed at having to pay $17 a seat, but the biggest controversy surrounded the company, TDK, which sponsored the tour. TDK is a manufacturer of blank cassettes, considered to be a big reason for the current record industry slump. (Rock fans tape friends' LPs instead of buying their own.) The German record-makers' association called the Stones-TDK connection "a betrayal" and vowed, "We will fight the fact that these artists, who owe us such a great deal, are cooperating with the grave diggers of the music business." Chastened, EMI, the Stones' overseas record company, seemed to regret having approved the sponsors. Admitted Wilfried Jung, the firm's German chief, "It does make us look a bit daft."

Difference of Opinion
Jim Belushi, John's kid brother, who plays the Pirate King in the road company of The Pirates of Penzance, was none too thrilled with a recent review of his performance in a suburban Boston paper. Belushi "buckles more than he swashes," wrote the critic, J. William Breslin, who received a nasty note from the actor a few days later. "Your review has hurt my feelings," wrote Belushi in a letter littered with obscenities and misspelled words. "If I ever play this town again, I hope you are dead." Belushi also enclosed what he called "an intelligent letter." "Dear Jim," it began, "You were brilliant."

Furthermore
Of her eighth and most recent marriage, to Mexican lawyer Felipe de Alba, Zsa Zsa Gabor, who's around 63, admits, "It was the biggest mistake of my life. It only lasted 10 minutes. So from now on, my real friends will be animals. All my husbands were animals, anyway." Whew!

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